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LIBERTY TRACTS. 



No. I. 



THE 



CHICAGO LIBERTY MEETING 



HELD AT 

CENTRE MU8IG HULL 

APRIL 30. li 



Lincoln, Speech of October ib, 1854- 

"Our reliance is in the love of liberty which God has planted in us. 

"If this be treason, make the most of rr "-Patrick Henry. 



PUBLISHED BY 

CENTRAL ANTI=IHPERIALIST LEAGUE 

TACOMA BUILDING, CHICAGO 

1899 



"5* 









"We, the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect 
Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the com- 
mon defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of 
liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Con- 
stitution of the United States of America. "—Preamble. 



"All persons born or naturalized in the United Slates, and subject to 
the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State 
wherein they reside . "— .Fourteenth Amendment. 



"It toas in the oath I took that I tvould, to the best of my ability, pre- 
serve, protect, and defend the constitution of the United States. * * * Nor 
was it my vieio that 1 might take an oath to get power, and break the oath 
in using that poiver. * * * / did understand * * * that m,y oath 
imposed upon me the duty of preserving, to the best of my ability, by every 
indispensable means, that government, that nation, of ivhich the Consti- 
tution was the organic law." — Lincoln. 



"The late M. Guizot once askejl me how long I thought our republic 
would endure? I replied: 'So long as the ideas of the men who founded 
it continue dominant,' and he assented. "—Lowell. 



A FORMER INSTANCE, A ( D. 1565. 

"He [Menendez] knezv, he said, nothing of greater moment to his 
Majesty than the conquest and settlement of Florida. The climate tvas 
healthful and the soil fertile, and, worldly advantages aside, it was peopled 
by a race sunk in the thickest shades of infidelity. 'Such grief,' 1 he pur- 
sued, 'seizes me. when I behold this multitude of wretched Indians, that I 
should choose the conquest and settling of Florida above all commands, 
offices, and dignities which your Majesty might bestow. ' "— Parkman's 
Works, vol. i, p. 99. 

"lam here to plant the Gospel. If you [French heretics'] will give up 
your arms and banners and place yourselves at my mercy, you may do so, 
and I will act toward you as God shall give me grace. Do as you will, for 
other than this you can have neither truce nor friendship 'with me."— 
Id. p. 136. 

"May the Lord deliver us from all cant. May the Lord, whatever else 
He do or forbear, teach us to look facts honestly in the face, and to beware 
(with a kind of shudder) of smearing them all over with our despicable and 
damnable palaver." — Thomas Carlyle. 



"In vain we call old notions fudge, 

And bend our conscience to our dealing; 
The ten commandments will not budge, 
And stealing will continue stealing. ,, ~ Lowell. 



INDEX, 

PLATFORM, Central Anti-Imperialist League, 4 

THE CALL, 5 

THE ORGANIZATION OF MEETING, - - 6 

OPENING ADDRESS, Chairman President Henry 

Wape Rogers, 7 

WHY WE PROTEST, Rev. Jenkin Lloyd Jones, 11 

THE PHILIPPINE WAR, Prof. J. Lawrence 

Laughlln, 14 

LIBERTY OR DESPOTISM, Edwin Burritt Smith, 23 

DEMOCRACY OR TYRANNY, Sigmund ZeislER, 29 

DEMOCRACY OR MILIT A RISM, Miss Jane Addams 35 

REPUBLIC OR EMPIRE, Bishop J. R. Spalding, 40 

REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON RESOLUTIONS, 

Prop. Wm. Gardner Hale, 48 

THE RESOLUTIONS, .•-.-.. 50 



PLATFORM. 



The frank expression of honest convictions upon great 
questions of public policy is vital to the health and even 
to the preservation of representative government. Such 
expression is, therefore, the sacred duty of American 
citizens. 

We hold that the policy known as imperialism is hostile 
to liberty and tends toward militarism, an evil from which 
it has been our glory to be free. We regret that it is 
now necessary in the land of Washington and Lincoln to 
reaffirm that all men, of whatever race or color, are entitled . 
to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. We still main- 
tain that governments derive their just powers from the 
consent of the governed. We insist that the forcible sub- 
jugation of a purchased people is "criminal aggression" and 
open disloyalty to the distinctive principles of our govern- 
ment. 

We honor our soldiers and sailors in the Philippine 
islands for their unquestioned bravery; and we mourn with 
the whole nation for the American lives that have been 
sacrificed. Their duty was obedience to orders; our duty 
is diligent inquiry and fearless protest. We hold that our 
government created the conditions which have brought 
about the sacrifice. 

We earnestly condemn the policy of the present national 
administration in the Philippines. It is the spirit of '76 
that our government is striving to extinguish in those 
islands; we denounce the attempt and demand its aban- 
donment. We deplore and resent the slaughter of the 
Filipinos as a needless horror, a deep dishonor to our 
nation. 

We protest against the extension of American empire 
by Spanish methods, and demand the immediate cessation 
of the war against liberty, begun by Spain and continued 
by us. We believe that a foolish pride is the chief obstacle 
to a speedy settlement of all difficulties. As Mr. Glad- 
stone said to England, "We are strong enough * * * 
to cast aside all considerations of false shame * * * 
walking in the plain and simple ways of right and justice." 
Our government should at once announce to the Filipinos 
its purpose to grant them under proper guarantees of order 
the independence for which they have so long fought, and) 
should seek by diplomatic methods to secure this inde- 
pendence by the common consent of nations. It is today 
as true of the Filipinos as it was a year ago of the Cubans 
that they "are and of right ought to be free and inde- 
pendent." 



THE CALL. 



The undersigned call upon all lovers of liberty and justice 
io attend a public meeting to protest against American impe- 
rialism, and especially against the attempt of the United 
States to subjugate by force the inhabitants of the Philippine 
Islands: 



Henry Wade Rogers. 
H. E. Von Hoist. 
A. C. McClurg. 
Jane Addams. 
Murray F. Tuley. 
H. W. Thomas. 
R. A. White. 
_E. F. Davis. 
W. K. Ackerman. 
Francis H. Peabody. 
W. M. Slater. 

Sigmund Zeisler. 
J. J. Glessner. 
Jenkin Lloyd Jones. 
C L. Hutchinson. 
Edwin Burritt Smith. 
Graham Taylor. 
Howard Leslie Smith. 
Andrew McLeish. 
Leroy D. Thoman. 
George L. Paddock. 
Thomas Moran. 
W. H. Barnum. 
William C. Ewing. 
S. P. McConnell. 
Q. M. Eckels. 
Otto Gresham. 

I. K. Boyesen. 
August Blum. 
H. A. Gradner. 
F. W. Gookin. 
John A. King. 
Thomas M. Hoyne. 
F. H. McCulloch. 
Edward O. Brown. 
William G. Hale. 
<C. R. Henderson. 
H. R. Donaldson. 
J. Laurence Laughlin. 
Paul Shorey. 
J. R. Angell. 
Ernst Freund. 
A. C. Miller. 
Charles Zeublin. 

F. B. Tarbell. 

G. L. Hendrickson. 
J. W. A. Young. 
A. H. Tolman. 

S. W. Cutting. 
S. H. Clark. 
F. Starr. 



W. L. Burnham. 
J. J. Halsey. 
G. W. Schmidt. 
S. S. Rogers. 
H. O. Nourse. 

C. F. Browne. 
J. L. Jackson. 
R. C. Catterall. 
R. A. Millikan. 
W. T. Field. 

E. B. Tolman. 
Adlai T. Ewing. 
Wm. Morton Payne. 

D. F. Bremner. 
W. McCumber. 
Joseph Donnersberger. 
Frank H. Scott. 

W. M. Meagher. 
William Kent. 
A. B. Pond. 
I. K. Pond. 
L. F. Post. 
W. P. Black. 
H. B. Fuller. 
J. Hieglits. 
Edward J. Kuh. 
C. S. Sturges. 
H. L. Wait. 

F. M. LeMoyne. 
J. A. Miller. 

S. R. Taber. 
J. H. Moore. 
J. J. Watt. 
W. J. Herrick. 
M. Hoyne. 
J. H. Bowman. 
W. C. Young. 
J. J. Kinsley. 
L. A. Goddard. 
J. Rosenthal. 
W. W. Fenn. 
M. J. Russell. 
W. Oppenheim. 
L. Winchester. 
J. Z. White. 
W. S. Crosby. 
F. P. Schmidt. 

E. O. Jordan. 

F. I. Carpenter. 
J. T. Hatfield. 
John H. Gray. 



S. S. Greeley. 
H. S. Oakley. 
J. V. Blake. 
F. W. Root. 

E. D. Wheelock. 
D. M. Lord. 
George E. Dawson. 
H. S. Hyman. 

J. W. Hiner. 

F. W. Miller. 
M. W. Haynes. 
F. S. Howard. 
Kirk Hawes. 
J. W. Fifield. 

J. H. Bowman. 
W. Carwardine. 
J. C. Hessler. 
C. P. Van Inwegen. 
W. R. Mitchell. 
H. W. Thurston. 

F. W. Lor en z. 

G. S. Foster. 
William Prentiss. 
C. F. Harding. 
Lynden Evans. 
C. H. Bunker. 
H. S. Shedd. 

C. A. Torrey. 
J. J. Corcoran. 
W. H. Maguire. 

F. H. Wentworth. 
J. Sullivan. 

G. H. Loehr. 
F. M. Browne. 

D. H. Perkins. 
J. E. Todd. 

H. L. Bliss. 
F. H. Monroe. 

F. D. Butler. 

E. P. Rosenthal. 
E. W. Maguire. 
E. E. Prussing. 

G. C. Prussing. 
Jos. A. O'Donnell. 
C. W. Pearson. 

W. R. Bridgeman. 
J. H. Wigmore. 
H. R. Hatfield. 
H. S. Fiske. 
and 315 others. 



THE OFFICERS OF THE MEETING.. 



Chairman, 
PRESIDENT HENRY WADE ROGERS. 

Chaplain, 
'REV. J. W. FIFIELD. 

Secretary, 
HOWARD LESLIE SMITH, Esq. 

Committee on Resolutions, 

PROF. WM. GARDNER HALE, RICHARD T. CRANE, 
PROF. ALBERT H. TOLMAN, WILLIAM KENT 
and HOWARD EESUE SMITH. 

Vice-Presidents : 



THEODORE J. AMBERG. 
MISS JANE ADDAMS. 
WILLIAM K. ACKERMAN. 
DANKMAR ADLER. 
WILLIAM H. BARNUM. 
H. L. BLISS. 
JAMES VILA BLAKE. 
WILLIAM P. BLACK. 
JAMES H. BOWMAN. 
CHARLES F. BROWNE. 
FRANCIS F. BROWNE. • 
EDWARD 0. BROWN. 
DAVID F. BREMNER. 
WALTER R. BRIDGEMAN. 
RICHARD T. CRANE. 
W. H. CARWARDINE. 
STARR W. CUTTING. 
CLARENCE S. DARROW. 
H. H. DONALDSON. 
,T< ISEPH DONNERSBERGER. 
EDWARD F. DUNNE. 
JOSEPH W. ERRANT. 
LYNDEN EVANS. 
ADLAI T. EWING. 
WILLIAM G. EWING. 
W. W. FENN. 
DANIEL M. LORD. 
HENRY C. LYTTON. 
A. C. M'CTURG. 
S. P. MOONNELL. 
F. W. MILLAR. - 
JAMES A. MTLLER. 
THOMAS A. MORAN. 
HORACE S. OAKLEY. 
JOSEPH A. O'DjONNELL. 
GEORGE L. PADDOCK: 
WILLIAM MORTON VAYNE. 
DWIGHT II. PERKINS. 
FRANCIS B. PEABODY. 
LOUIS P. POST. 
ALLEN B. POND. 
GEORGE E. PRUSSING. 
EUGENE E. PRESSING. 
WILLIAM PRENTISS. 
WILLIAM RAPP. 
S. S. ROGERS. 
JULIUS ROSENTHAL. 
FREDERICK W. ROOT. 
FRANK II. SCOTT. 
PAUL SHOREr. 



J. W. FIFIELD. 

ERNEST FREUND. 

HENRY B. FULLER. 

J. J. GLESSNER. 

F. W. GOOKIN. 

S. S. GURLEY. 

OTTO GRESHAM. 

JOHN H. GRAY. 

WILLIAM G. HALE. 

KIRK HAWES. 

J. J. HALSEY. 

MYRON W. HAYNES. 

JAMES T. HATFIELD. 

C. R. HENDERSON. 

FREDERICK S. HEBARD. 

H. E, VON HOLST. 

LOCKWOOD HONORE. 

C. L. LIUTCHINSON. 

THOMAS M. HOYNE. 

JOHN L. JACKSON. 

JENKIN LLOYD JONES. 

WILLIAM KENT. 

JOHN A. KING. 

EDWARD J. KUH. 

J. LAURENCE LAUGHLIN. 

ANDREW M'LETSH. 

GEORGE A. SCHILLING . 

HOWARD LESLIE .SMITH. 

EDWIN BURRITT SMITH. 

FREDERICK STARR. 

W. M. SALTER. 

LEWIS STUART. 

FRANK B. TOREY. 

A. II . TOLMAN. 

GRAHAM TAYLOR. 

LEROY D. THOMAN. 

M. P.ROSS THOMAS. 

E. B. TOLMAN. 

J. F. TODD. 

MURRAY F. TULEY. 

JAMES J. WAIT. 

FRANKLIN II. WENTWORTH. 

EDWIN D. WHEELOCK. 

R. A. WHITE. 

JOHN Z. WHITE. 

MRS. TL M. WILMARTH. 

JOHN II. WIGMORE. 

MRS. ELLA E. YOUNG. 

CHARLES ZEUBLIN. 

SIGMUND ZEISLER. 



OPENING ADDRESS, 

Dr. Henry Wade Rogers : 

Fellow Citizens — The gentlemen who issued the call 
under which we are assembled have asked me to act 
as chairman of this meeting. 

We are here to express our convictions on a great 
public question which concerns the duty, the wel- 
fare and the honor of our country. Some of those 
who differ with us in opinion and who are intolerant 
of all opposition may accuse us of giving aid and 
comfort to the enemy. That is the answer one is 
given when he ventures to call in question the wisdom 
of the course now being pursued. I do not know, 
however, that we are under obligations to defer to 
intolerance by refraining at a time like this from de- 
claring our opinions on the questions we are here to 
consider. I am sure that we all recognize the fact 
that the problem which confronts the country is full 
of perplexities and that it is one upon which good 
men may differ. I am confident, too, that we recog- 
nize the honesty and sincerity of the president of the 
United States and that we do not for a moment call 
in question the rectitude of his intentions. We are 
not here to discredit his administration nor to em- 
"barrass him in the performance of his duty. 

The postmaster-general of the United States de- 
clared in this city a few weeks since that President 
McKinley was anxiously awaiting for the American 
people to tell him what to do with the Philippines. 
The president from the beginning of this controversy 
has taken pains to have it understood that he wanted 
to know the thought of the people of this country 
on the great problem with which the government 
has to deal. I have too much confidence in the sin- 
cerity of the man to believe that he courts expressions 
of opinions from one side only. 

We are told by those who do not agree with us 
that it is too late to discuss the question as to the 
wisdom of taking the Philippines ; that we have already 



taken them ; that our flag is there and that there it 
must remain ; that we cannot recede without national 
dishonor ; that we have a responsibility to civilization 
and humanity from which we cannot escape and do 
our duty; that those who favor the conquest of the 
Filipinos by the sword represent "the enlightened con- 
science and patriotism of the people" and have "the 
true American spirit," while those who think other- 
wise are false to patriotism and to duty and represent 
a policy that does not stand for the highest Amer- 
icanism. This superiority of patriotism which some 
of these gentlemen arrogantly assume and this en- 
lightened conscience which they boastfully assert they 
possess is a kind of hyperbole that, to use Macaulay's 
oft-repeated words, ''lies without deceiving." It is 
the most arrant nonsense. It requires an unlimited 
amount of assurance to charge such men as Senator 
Hoar, Carl Schurz, Bishop Potter of New York and 
President Eliot of Harvard with a want of patriotism 
and with being devoid of an enlightened conscience. 
The abuse which these gentlemen who claim a monop- 
oly of patriotism bestow upon those who differ with 
them in opinion discredits only those who indulge 
in it. That kind of clamor never yet silenced a con- 
scientious man nor convinced a sensible one. Free- 
dom of speech among self-respecting men cannot be 
thus suppressed. 

Applause interrupted the speaker at this point. Con- 
tinuing, he said : 

We deny that the United States possess the Phil- 
ippines. We have not taken them and the people 
who inhabit them are not our subjects and they are 
not in rebellion against our rightful rule over them. 
We have not yet embarked upon a policy of imperial- 
ism and may God forbid that we ever shall. 

It is true that by the treaty of peace Spain ceded to 
the United States the Philippine islands and that the 
United States agreed to pay to Spain $20,000,000. 
But it is important to consider the legal effect of such 
a treaty. What is it that Spain has sold and the 
United States purchased? Has Spain sold the Fil- 
ipinos and have we bought them as so many cattle 
or as so many slaves? I deny that that is the legal 
effect of the treaty. Spain has simply renounced its 



rights over those islands and this it has done in our 
favor. But it has not and it could not make those 
people our subjects against their will. The law does 
not compel these people to accept the United States 
as sovereign over them. The subjects of a state are 
not at that state's disposal like a farm or a herd of 
cattle. If during the revolution Great Britain had 
ceded her American colonies to Turkey, would the 
colonists have been under obligations to accept the 
supremacy of the sultan? Or if during the civil war 
the United States had ceded the southern states to 
Mexico, would the people within the ceded territory 
have been under obligations to submit themselves to 
the wishes of the ruler of Mexico? I think not. 

Let me quote from the law of nations as it is laid 
down by Vattel. That writer, after conceding that in 
cases of necessity one state may cede to another a 
portion of its territory, goes on to say : "When, 
therefore, in such a case the state gives up a town or 
a province to a neighbor or to a powerful enemy the 
cession ought to remain valid as to the state, since she 
had the right to make it; nor can she any longer lay 
claim to the town or province thus alienated, since she 
has relinquished every right she could have over it. 
But the province or town thus abandoned and dis- 
membered from the state is not obliged to receive the 
new master whom the state attempted to set over it. 
Being separated from the society of which it was a 
member, it resumes all of its original rights, and if it 
be capable of defending its liberty against the prince 
who would subject it to his authority it may lawfully 
resist him/' 

This is exactly the situation in which the Filipinos 
are placed. They have never been subject to the au- 
thority of the United States. They do not acknowledge 
the right of Spain to subject them to that authority 
or to do more than to relinquish Spanish authority 
over them. According to Vattel they are lawfully 
resisting us. Let me also quote from an acknowl- 
edged American authority upon the same subject — 
President Woolsey of Yale. In his work on interna- 
tional law that writer, in speaking of treaties of ces- 
sion, asks whether the party making the cession is 
under any obligation to secure the newcomers in pos- 
session, and says : 



"Must the former do anything beyond renouncing 
his rights of sovereignty over the territory and leav- 
ing it free and open to the new sovereign? To us it 
appears that this is all he is bound to do. If, then, the 
inhabitants should resist and reject the new sovereign, 
as tEey have undoubted right to do — for who gave 
any state the right to dispose of its inhabitants? — 
the question now is to be settled between the province 
or territory and the conqueror." 

The international lawyer knows that we are en- 
gaged in a war of conquest. When an armed force 
lands upon the territory of a people against that peo- 
ple's will and seeks to bring them under subjection 
to a government to , which they have never in any 
way acknowledged allegiance, they are there as in- 
vaders and conquerors. We cannot rid ourselves of 
that character in the eyes of the world and in the 
eyes of the international law by any high-sounding 
phrases about these people being our wards and about 
the obligations we are under to civilization. The 
greatest service we can render to civilization is to 
show that Ave respect the rights of man. A war of 
conquest is a war of criminal aggression. With all 
due deference to Governor Roosevelt, who considers 
the statement cant, I venture to say that such a war 
ought never to be entered upon by a nation founded 
upon the principle that governments derive their just 
powers from the consent of the governed. 

We fought the war with Spain to give liberty to 
the people of Cuba. Congress declared in April, 1898, 
that the people of the island of Cuba "are and of right 
ought to be free and independent." The people of the 
Philippines have the same right to be free and inde- 
pendent. And yet we are fighting them that we may 
make them dependent upon the United States. We 
seek to excuse our conduct to ourselves by saying 
that after all the time has not arrived when these peo- 
ple ought to be free and independent and that until it 
does we will assume guardianship over them and 
will for their sakes bear "the white man's burden." 
This is very kind of us, but these people decline to be- 
come our wards and according to my thinking they 
are entitled to be consulted in the matter. In June, 
1898, Admiral Dewey sent a telegram from Manila 

10 



to Secretary Long at Washington in which he gave 
his estimate of the Filipinos as follows : "In my opin- 
ion these people are far superior in their intelligence 
and more capable of self-government than the natives 
of Cuba and I am familiar with both races." 

For one I am opposed to the United States inter- 
meddling in the affairs of Europe, Asia or Africa. I 
am opposed to imperialism, which I believe to be in- 
consistent with our theories of government. I am in 
favor of keeping to our own hemisphere and opposed 
to all acquisitions of territory elsewhere excepting 
only necessary naval stations. I am above all opposed 
to the acquisitions of territory through wars of con- 
quest. I am opposed to rushing into difficulties that 
do not concern us except in imaginary ways. 

Dr. Rogers' statement was received with cheers, 
and after they subsided he concluded his oration as 
follows : 

We are asked what the United States can do under 
the unfortunate conditions that now exist. We can- 
not return the Philippines to Spain. We cannot sur- 
render them to any European or Asiatic state or allow 
them to be treated as" a football among nations. But 
the United States can put an end to the war of con- 
quest by suspending hostilities, by declaring to the 
nations that it assumes a protectorate of the Philippine 
islands against foreign aggression and by calling 
upon the natives to establish their own internal gov- 
ernment. When that experiment has failed, if fail it 
should, it will be time enough to consider what should 
then be done. 



WHY WE PROTEST. 

Address of Jenkin Lloyd Jones. 

In silence and in patience we have been called upon 
to witness what seems to us a pathetic and deplorable 
lapse from the high ideals of democracy ; in silence 
and in patience we have received day by day the sad 
news of the sacrifice of the lives of American youths 
in far-off islands ; in silence and in patience we have 

11 



listened to the attendant news that told of the whole- 
sale slaughter of the untrained children of the tropics, 
whose only sin, as it seemed to us, was the instinct — 
deep implanted in human nature — to be free. We 
have been compelled to listen in patience and in silence 
to the cry of a helpless people who were lifting mute 
hands to the God of the heavens, begging for them 
and their children the lands and the homes that were 
ordained to them by a providence non-American. 

We have come to the time in this presence when 
silence ceases to be a virtue and patience calls for re- 
sistance, and we are here today to demand a higher 
interpretation of the words "patriot" and "patriotism." 
As was suggested by a silent member on the plat- 
form just before we came into this presence, "patriot" 
used to mean a man who was willing to die for the 
freedom of his own country ; now it would seem to 
come to mean in this country the willingness of a 
man to die that the freedom of a remote fellow-being 
mav be taken away from him. 

Friends, you may at other times arrange a dis- 
cussion of this problem on its economic and business 
side. Today we are here on this holy day, conse- 
crated to religion, to say that there is no phase of this 
question worthy of debate other than the ethical and 
religious phase of it. For the ethics we believe in, the 
God we worship, and the bible we study, do not war- 
rant the aggrandizement of one nation at the cost of 
another, and will not justify greed in its grasp of the 
land that belongs to another. 

We are here today to speak as best we may, each 
for himself, for that prince of peace, and protest in his 
name against that Christian pity that would extend 
its boundaries on the point of a bayonet, and em- 
phasize its gospel with the explosion of powder. Once 
more, and last, we are here to plead for that last hope 
of humanity — democracy — that never yet has found a 
place in its lexicon for the words "colonies," "in- 
vasion" and "conquest." When those words come 
into our dictionary then the words "democracy" and 
"republicanism" must be blotted out. We stand here 
for those who believe that the revolutionary fathers 
meant what they said when they declared that all just 
governments must derive their power from the con- 

12 



sent of the governed. And we are here to forecast 
a sad future for this beloved land of ours if it dare 
trust quantity rather than quality, and dare under- 
take to extend its boundaries by methods which may 
be justifiable to monarchy, but never have been jus- 
tifiable and never can be realized by republicanism. 

We have nothing to do today with Aguinaldo and 
his pathetic band of patriots. It goes without saying 
that if they are not already conquered they soon will 
be. Of course, we have guns and powder and men 
enough to travel those islands from shore to shore 
and leave them a desert waste, if that is what we are 
aften But, friends, it is for us to remember that Ma- 
nila is but a little spot on the margin of one island 
which is itself as large as the state of Virginia, and 
if we have taken Manila and captured that little band 
that has been trying to protect it, we have got no 
further into the invasion of that tropical Virginia than 
if we had taken Alexandria, outside of Washington. 
We are discussing this afternoon the future rights of 
those whom God has placed in an area as large as our 
country would be, measured from here to New Orleans 
on the south, and longer than from here to Buffalo on 
the east. We are here to discuss the future relations 
of 1,200 to 2,000 islands, which now hold nine million 
—and more — people. We have begun at the small 
end of an interminable war for conquest, which can 
be paralleled only by our own experience in trying 
to settle the Indian question in this country, without 
any of the geographical or ethnological questions 
which come in to justify — poorly — our own treatment 
of these nearer brethren of the lower world of intelli- 
gence and development. 

And so, friends, as patriots, as those who love the 
flag — and some of us have followed it into danger and 
stood by it when it was torn by bullets — in the name 
of that flag, we call for that moral courage that dares 
pull it down when it can thus better represent the 
rights of humanity where physical courage raised it 
up. 

We are here — the last word I have to say is that we 
are here, not for a moment and not for opposition, 
but we are here to stand for the future honor of our 
country and the further triumph of republicanism. 

13 



Our service will be needed as long as there are those 
who would read democracy in terms of military power 
and who believe that the physical arm of man, which 
never has been strong enough to save any nation 
that the sun ever shone upon, is stronger, of more im- 
port than the spiritual power of man, which never yet 
has been defeated by any empire or power since time 
began. 



THE PHILIPPINE WAR. 

Address of J. Laurence Laughlin. 

I have great respect for many of those who differ 
from us and who believe that war and expan- 
sion are just and wise. But as they have a right to 
their opinions, so we have to ours ; and let us calmly 
give the grounds for our beliefs, knowing that the 
fairness and intelligence of the American people will 
decide correctly between us. We are of those who 
believe that it should be asked of a public action 
whether it is right and just, not whether we are strong 
enough to do it. 

We are not now concerned with the right or wrong 
of the original war with Spain. That is past and 
gone. We are not here to discuss things which cannot 
be changed. There is here no need of words about 
how we came by the Philippines. We are there today, 
as a fact. It is also a fact that we are in Cuba — but, 
thank God ! we are not distributing liberty to Cubans 
with rapid-firing guns. Why are we doing it in the 
Philippines? Because some one has blundered there; 
hence the useless expiation of thousands of innocent 
lives, and the consequent horror and loneliness in 
thousands of homes. A war for humanity against 
the Spanish in Cuba and at the instance of Congress 
has drifted into a war for conquest against the Fil- 
ipinos at the will of the Executive. 

Have we gone to war only after exhausting all the 
arts of diplomacy and conciliation? No, we have 
gone to war first, despising the arts of statesmanship. 
That is why we demand that war should cease until 

14 



every device of peaceful negotiation should be tried, 
and tried in vain. We went there with uplifted club, 
saying: "We bought you, you belong to us. Sur- 
render outright, or we will subjugate you." And then 
because they did just what our forefathers did at Lex- 
ington and Concord, we sent more troops and killed 
more natives to satisfy our prestige before the world. 
What more like a coward and a bully before a help- 
less child ! 

Have we forgotten the attempt of Napoleon I. to 
conquer Toussaint L'Ouverture with veteran battal- 
ions, which melted away before the fevers of Hayti? 
Will not the day come when Aguinaldo may claim a 
niche in history alongside Toussaint L'Ouverture, as 
the defender of his country ? Will not the day come 
when we shall all be ashamed of this unholy war? 

They tell us we must stay in the Philippines in 
order to obtain markets for our goods, and to give 
us a base for our trade with China and the East. Nay, 
one expansive nature says : "We must expand our 
trade even if it costs 1,000, 10,000, 100,000 lives." 
There you have merciless commercialism run riot. Is 
it really true that America has become a soulless 
statistical machine to make profit by trade ? Have we 
no bowels of compassion? Have we nothing left of 
right, of justice, of honor? Are we ready to sell good 
Anglo-Saxon lives in an indefensible war of conquest 
for a mess of pottage? Cursed be the day when 
that can be said of us ! Now, even if we could gain 
enormous trade and profit by such dishonor, there 
are not words enough in our vocabulary to express 
the abhorrence we should feel at such immorality. 
It is time to hear the voices of men of character 
ring clear and loud in protest against such a despi- 
cable policy. 

But if, in return for a policy of conquest instead 
of humanity, of murderous depopulation instead of 
peaceful negotiation, it should prove that there would 
be no profits of trade to speak of, no expansion of trade 
that we might not have obtained without this enor- 
mous loss of money and life, then the men who have 
brought us into this pass ought to be shriveled by 
public indignation and disappear from public life. 

From 1 883- 1 890 the total annual value of merchan- 

15 



dise imported and exported by the Philippine islands 
averaged about $34,000,000. If the profits were as 
great as 10 per cent, and if the Americans could have 
controlled every cent of the trade, the gain would have 
been insufficient to pay merely the interest on the 
war loan. To keep only a single division of our army 
in the field costs about $20,000,000, many times as 
much as the gain from the total trade with the Phil- 
ippines. It is said that our new possessions in the 
East will necessitate a much enlarged navy ; yet the 
gains from their whole trade would be eaten up by 
only one or two new ships. The whole of the trade, 
however, cannot be held by the United States — as 
everyone knows — any more than it was held by Spain. 
Therefore, the actual profits of our share in the whole 
would be so insignificant as not to be worth the loss 
of one American soldier ; a pitiful sum to offer a great 
nation as a return for dishonor. 

It will be said, however, that under a strong gov- 
ernment and modern methods of industry the islands 
will develop an enormous wealth in the future, which 
we should control and profit by. Grant that — al- 
though to me it seems doubtful. I insist that whether 
the United States obtains a share or not of this in- 
creasing trade will depend not at all upon our owning 
the Philippine islands. It is understood by the world 
that we cannot adopt the exclusive policy of Spain 
and shut up the ports to all trade but our own. Since 
we must admit all other nations to the Philippine 
ports upon the same terms that we enjoy, our ability 
to compete there will depend entirely upon our indus- 
trial conditions at home. Under conditions wholly 
independent of the war with Spain, we have raised 
the value of our exports to foreign markets to a sum 
never reached before in all our history. That in itself 
is a full and sufficient refutation to the claim that 
we need to own foreign ports in order to sell our goods. 
We would not sell any more of our goods, or any dif- 
ferent goods, to Great Britain than we sell today, even 
if we owned every inch of the British islands. Whether 
we shall sell much or little to the Philippine islands 
depends upon what they can produce to offer us, and 
upon our ability to supply the goods they desire 
cheaper than other nations. Only natives can be 

16 






counted upon as laborers able to withstand the dead- 
ly malaria and fevers. Hence the amount of future 
production to be expected in those islands must grow 
very slowly, certainly no faster than the development 
of new capacities and qualities in a race of fixed cus- 
toms and rigid habits of thinking. Our trade will be 
limited by what they can purchase by their own prod- 
ucts, which are chiefly hemp, sugar, copra (the dried 
meat of the cocoanut) and tobacco. I question whether 
our farmers who are beginning to grow beet sugar will 
welcome the competition of Philippine sugar. On the 
other hand, what do they import? Chiefly rice, 
canned goods and vegetables, cotton goods, some iron 
and steel, kerosene, paper and various other articles 
in small amounts. (We might have exterminated the 
Filipinos by sending them certain brands of our 
canned goods.) 

If we wish to increase our trade with the Filipinos 
or any other nation, we must look within, not without. 
Our ability to sell in competition with others depends 
upon the richness of our natural resources, the skill 
and efficiency of our laborers, the organization of our 
industries, the invention and use of machinery, low 
cost of transportation by sea and land, a knowledge 
of foreign markets and adaptability to the customs and 
prejudices of our buyers. Why has the United States 
recently taken the lead of the world in the iron and 
steel trade? Because of the abundance and cheapness 
of our ores, the wonderful machinery by which it is 
loaded into and out of ships, the great capacity of 
new transports on our lakes, supplies of good coal, the 
new methods of coking by which the smoke is con- 
sumed, production in large quantities, skillful labor, 
scientific management and low cost of transportation. 
The reason why the bridge over the Atbara in Egypt 
for General Kitchener was awarded to an American 
firm was because the above advantages allowed us to 
build it cheaper and more quickly than the best firms 
of Great Britain. It makes no difference to our trade 
who owns the Nile, so long as we can build the best 
bridge at the lowest cost. 

Why has commerce between our Pacific ports and 
the East greatly expanded of late? For the same 
reasons already specified. And because the cotton 

17 



factories of the New South are sending their goods 
directly to the Orient across our Western states. Our 
trade with the Philippine islands depends far more 
upon those smoking chimneys in the South than upon 
the rapid-firing guns of the army. Give us this won- 
derfully low cost of production in the South — where 
all the materials of the cotton and iron industries are 
assembled together by nature — and our goods can no 
more be kept out of foreign markets than water can 
be prevented from flowing down hill. Already, with- 
out colonies, our export trade in manufactures has 
increased during 1889- 1898 from $138,000,000 to 
$290,000,000, and our agricultural exports from $532,- 
000,000 to $853,000,000. What greater development 
could we ask ? In the same years our exports to China 
have quadrupled. If trade is growing like this, why 
should we resort to conquest, when it is likely that 
conquest means no gains of trade, but only loss of life 
and increased taxation? 

They tell us, indeed, that trade follows the flag. It 
would be equally sensible to say that game follows 
the hunter, or that the horse follows the cart. You 
may wave the flag until its honored stripes have been 
worn into tatters, or you may cover the waters of 
Luzon with a new navy, but you will not increase 
our trade one whit, unless you have the economic 
advantages above enumerated ; and, if we have them, 
we will inevitably have the trade with or without the 
army and navy. When our ability to compete in for- 
eign markets is proved, then there our trade will go, 
and later our protecting flag will follow. 

If, then, there is so little real gain to be made out 
of the Philippine trade, to whom would the expan- 
sion of our territory be profitable? It is quite clear 
that the great body of our laboring men could not 
continue to live in that climate, and that there is no 
future there for them. They can have no lust of con- 
quest, because from them are recruited the brave rank 
and file who are always paying the cost of war with 
precious lives. Moreover, on them falls a heavy part 
of the cost of war and expansion. The hundreds of 
millions of dollars which the Philippine islands are 
costing us must be partly paid for by the new taxes, 
and by taxes on our shoes, our clothing, our hats and 



18 



on our tools of industry. If, then, the laboring class 
and the taxpayer must pay for this war, who gains ? I 
answer: Only the few favored ones who may obtain 
public office or concessions for banks, special fran- 
chises to build and operate street railways and other 
similar commercial privileges. That is, the working- 
men and the taxpayer are to be impudently asked to 
offer their lives and property that the favored few may 
have a few more chances to fill their purses. How long 
will we go on patiently submitting to this exploitation 
of the country for the good of those who are influ- 
ential in politics? 

Commercialism has sunk its fangs deep enough into 
our political life. It cannot go much further without 
stirring the righteous indignation of justice-loving 
Americans. Too long has public office been given 
not to selected fitness, but to service in advancement 
of personal ambitions. Great fortunes, rather than 
great statesmanship, too often fill the senate. Arro- 
gant wealth buys legislation, which should be as cheap 
for the frugal consumer as for the powerful producer. 
We send up an appeal — which will be followed by a 
shout of approval from the American electorate — for 
equality in treatment of all, both rich and poor, and 
for justice to the weak, whether white or brown. 

I have shown that we would have no more trade 
by owning the islands than we would have without, 
since our success in foreign markets depends upon 
home conditions; that the only commercial gains by 
conquest go to the few at the expense of the working- 
men and the taxpayer; and that if we could buy 
more trade at the expense of human life it would be 
immoral. 

They tell us that we must go on with the war until 
the Filipinos are thoroughly subjugated. It is as if a 
great bully should be allowed to go on beating a child 
until the victim is helpless. No, I say, stay the blows 
of war until we know that right aims the blow. You 
know, everyone knows, that if we were to say to the 
Filipinos that our flag is there as a symbol of protec- 
tion, that we are there solely to ensure them a free 
and independent government, war would cease in- 
stantly, not another life would be sacrificed. But 
what is really meant when it is said that the war 

19 



must go on until the natives are crushed, is this : We 
insist upon assuming that we have a right to govern 
the Filipinos in our way, against their will ; that we 
will make them acknowledge that by force ; hence go 
on with the war to show that we are big and strong 
enough to force them to be governed against their 
longings for freedom and independence. Further war 
is unnecessary except on the assumption that we have 
no intention to give them an independent govern- 
ment. Approach the problem anyway you please, it 
ever harks back to a question whether it is our policy 
to subjugate, or to free, the islanders. We are op- 
posed to all further war because we are opposed to the 
subjugation of the people under a foreign yoke; we 
propose a cessation of slaughter because we believe 
that the Filipinos "are and of right ought to be free 
and independent," under a protection by the United 
States which will save them from foreign aggression. 

They tell us there is nothing now to be done. Is 
it nothing to change war to peace? Is it nothing to 
stay the horrible slaughter of natives? Is it nothing 
to stop the operations by which our brave fellow-citi- 
zens are killed by bullets and by even more deadly 
disease? The assumption that the war is inevitable is 
gratuitous. If we have not promised the natives a free 
and independent government, it is our imperative duty 
to try that at once. That is the crux of the whole 
matter. So, when they tell us there is nothing now 
to be done, I say the principal thing remains to be 
done — to assure the Filipinos as to the policy of the 
United States in regard to their liberty. When Burke 
was thundering in the commons for the conciliation 
of the colonies, King George held that nothing could 
be done until the American colonists were subdued. 
Had King George granted us local self-government 
there would have been no War of the Revolution. 
There was a great deal that King George might have 
done that he did not do. Indeed, there is a great 
deal for the United States to do, now and at once, in 
the Philippines, unless we wish to repeat the obstinacy 
of the house of Hanover. 

They tell us we are disloyal, if we do not agree 
with any and every policy of conquest which may be 
arranged for us by the government; that we should not 

20 



increase the difficulties of a bad situation ; that we 
should not shake the arm of the man when he is tak- 
ing aim.* If a loyal soldier saw a column of our army 
defiling down by mistake into the wrong road, which 
led to disaster, would he be more or less loyal if he 
held his peace and uttered no word of warning? If I 
saw my brother in an excess of feeling striking a child, 
should I hold his arm to prevent the heavy blow 
which meant horrible and irremediable murder? 
Would I show more or less love and loyalty to him by 
withholding my dissuading voice, my preventing arm ? 
Is it disloyal to keep our nation in the path of honor? 
We who love our country most, wish most that its 
flag shall be unstained. It is subversive of free institu- 
tions to assume that the government is above criticism. 
When we act on the supposition that the President 
can do no wrong, we have a king and not a president 
— and the republic is dead. Ours are republican, not 
monarchical institutions. We do not intend to allow 
militarism to dominate our civic institutions as they 

*We have not waited until the war is over to make our pro- 
test, because silence is taken as an approval; and when the 
system has been fastened upon us, then there will be no use 
in protesting. The servants of the people have created a con- 
dition, and claim immunity from criticism against that which 
they have created. M3' position is that of Abraham Lincoln, 
Jan. 12, 1848, who oposed the Mexican war begun by the Presi- 
dent. (Addresses and Letters of Abraham Lincoln. Century 
Company edition of complete works, Vol. I., 100). 

"Some if not all the gentlemen on the other side of the house 
who have addressed the committee within the last two days 
have spoken rather complainingly, if I have rightly understood 
them, of the vote given a week or ten days ago, declaring that 
the war with Mexico was unnecessarily and unconstitutionally 
commenced by the President. I admit that such a vote should 
not be given in mere party wantonness, and that the one given 
is justly censurable, if it have no other better foundation. I am 
one of those who joined in that vote; and I did so under my 
best impression of the truth of the case. How I got this im- 
pression, and how it may possibly be remedied, I will now try 
to show. When the war began, it was my opinion that all 
those who, because of knowing too little or because of knowing 
too much, could not conscientiously oppose the conduct of the 
President in the beginning of it, should nevertheless, as good 
citizens and patriots, remain silent on that point, at least until 
the war should be ended. Some leading Democrats, including 
ex-President Van Buren, have taken the same view, as I under- 
stand them; and I adhered to it and acted upon it until since 
I took my seat here; and I think I should still adhere to it 
were it not that the President and his friends will not allow it 
to be so. Besides the continual effort of the President to argue 
every silent vote given for supplies into an indorsement of the 
justice and wisdom of his conduct," etc. 

Mr. Lincoln also hits at the center of our present situation 
when he speaks (p. 106) of the attempt "to involve the two coun- 
tries in a war, trusting to escape scrutiny by fixing the public 
gaze upon the exceeding brightness of military glory— that at- 
tractive rainbow that rises in showers of blood," etc. 

21 



have in France (in the Dreyfus case) to the humiliation 
of our sister republic. 

The president of the United States declared at At- 
lanta, Dec. 15, 1898, that the "flag has been planted 
in two hemispheres, where it remains the symbol of 
liberty and law, of peace and progress. Who will 
withdraw from the people over whom it floats its 
protecting folds ? Who will pull it down ?" In South 
Carolina officers of the United States are today seek- 
ing to convict those who shot down the wife and infant 
babe of the colored postmaster at Lake City. The flag 
protects those over whom it floats ; to the negroes it 
is a symbol of liberty and law. In the Philippines 
we are not hounding colored natives with the blood- 
hounds of anti-slavery days, but mowing them down 
with rapid-fire guns — "nigger hunting," it is grue- 
somely expressed. The flag there does not protect 
those over whom it floats. It is there, to the Filipinos, 
the emblem of tyranny and butchery.* I read — for 
what it is worth — from a letter written by Charles 
Brenner of Minneapolis, Kansas, on the attack at 
Caloocan by the Kansas regiment : "Company I had 
taken a few prisoners and stopped. The colonel or- 
dered them up into line time after time, and finally 

*I used the word "tyranny" because the flag is there wrongly 
made to represent an un-American policy of conquest for the 
subjugation of an inferior race, against their will, by a great 
and powerful nation. I said "butchery," because the indiscrim- 
inate slaughter of natives by offensive military operations in 
an unholy war of subjugation can be called by no other name. 
I am not attacking the flag, but a policy — a policy which makes 
our honored flag stand in the Philippines for conquest and sub- 
jugation. 

I am more truly loyal to the flag when I demand that it shall 
be used only as a symbol of liberty than those who are willing 
to see the flag wave as the emblem of expansion and conquest. 
It is strange that thoughtless intolerance can go so far as to 
fail to distinguish between my loyalty to the flag and my 
loyalty to a policy which dishonors the flag. I wish it to be 
understood that I yield to no man in my admiration for the 
bravery of the men and the skill of the officers in the army 
and navy. 

The principles on which I found my objection to the policy 
of subjugation are thus stated by Abraham Lincoln (sent me 
from Kansas by a Republican soldier of the civil war) : 

"No man is good enough to govern another man without 
that other's consent. When the white man governs himself, that 
is self-government; but when he governs himself and also gov- 
erns another man, that is more than self-government— that is 
despotism." (Speech of Oct. 16, 1854). "Our reliance is in the 
love of liberty which God has planted in us. Our defense is 
in the spirit which prizes liberty as the heritage of all men 
in all lands, everywhere. Those who deny freedom to others, 
deserve it not for themselves, and under a just God they can- 
not long retain it." (Letter to H. L. Pierce, April 6, 1859). 

22 



sent Captain Bishop back to start them. There oc- 
curred the hardest sight I ever saw. They had four 
prisoners and didn't know what to do with them. They 
asked Captain Bishop what to do, and he said : 'You 
know the orders,' and four natives fell dead."* 
Who will rescue the flag from such desecration ? Why, 
who else but those who put it there? In the name 
of the humanity for which we went to war we call 
upon them to save our flag from dishonor. The 
common-sense of the people knows that the flag can- 
not be immediately withdrawn ; but the moral sense 
of the people demands that so long as it remains there 
its protecting folds shall provide for white and brown 
alike a free and independent government and assur- 
ance from outside aggression. We demand that our 
public men should be men of conviction, that they 
should be vertebrates not mollusks. 



LIBERTY OR DESPOTISM. 

Address of Edwin Burritt Smith. 

It is high time to inquire, To what end do we con- 
tinue Spanish methods in the Philippines? Why this 
terrible sacrifice of American lives ? By what author- 
ity has Mr. McKinley sent forces, recruited to win 

*The parents of Charles Brenner live in Bennington, Kan., 
twelve miles from Minneapolis, Kan. This letter was handed by 
Brennan's father to Mr. A. P. Riddle, editor of the Minneapolis 
(Kan.) Messenger (Ottawa Co.). 

Captain Bishop (now major), who is regarded as a man of 
character by his neighbors, says in a letter dated "Caloocan 
Battlefield, March 1st," and published in the Republican- Journal, 
of Salina, Kan.: "The insurgents have not fired on us since 
last night, and I understand an attempt is being made to patch 
things up. My idea of the way is to kill the whole outfit, and 
blow the island out of existence." 

The soldiers are not responsible for orders given by superiors. 
But the incident in Brenner's letter is similar to one described 
by Harry P. Todd, Company M (the same company to which 
Brenner belonged), 20th Kansas Regiment, in a letter dated 
February 24th, at Caloocan, and printed in The Republican- 
Journal, of Salina, Kan., April 12, 1899: "Somehow or other some 
of the insurgents got around our line at the end of the bay and 
got back to town. There were 150 of them, and they captured 
our short line train and depot, and drove the guards back. 
That was at 4 o'clock yesterday morning, and by daylight the 
inside, or town guard, marched out toward our lines with 
ORDERS TO GIVE NO QUARTER TO ANY FILIPINO, 
and the guard marched straight along, killing every insurgent 
that poked his head in view. At one place they killed fifty and 
in all 180." 

23 



liberty for Cuba, to wage war against liberty in Asia? 
Why has he sent brave men to death wondering 
"What are we fighting for?" Why this awful slaugh- 
ter of natives ? To what purpose have we taken upon 
ourselves the burden of excessive taxation in perpe- 
tuity? For what sufficient reason, after more than a 
century of unparalleled achievement, have we become 
unfaithful to the traditions and principles which have 
made America distinctive among the nations of the 
world? Why do we allow our chosen representatives 
to assume arbitrary power? Why do we permit the 
establishment of a dual government at Washington, 
half representative and half despotic? To what end 
do we destroy the character of our institutions in a 
vain effort to share them with alien races? 

These inquiries involve vastly more than a few petty 
additions to our trade or even the welfare of the people 
of some remote islands. In the language of Senator 
Hoar, they involve "a greater danger than we have 
encountered since the pilgrims landed at Plymouth — ■ 
the danger that we are to be transformed from a re- 
public, founded on the declaration of independence, 
guided by the counsels of Washington, into a vulgar, 
commonplace empire, founded upon physical force." 

True, Mr. McKinley says that "no imperial designs 
lurk in the American mind. They are alien to Amer- 
ican sentiment, thought and purpose. Our priceless 
principles undergo no change under a tropical sun. 
They go with the flag." 

These are fine phrases ; but we shall do well, as Mr. 
Boutwell suggests, not to confuse the issue with what 
Mr. McKinley says. The inquiry must be confined to 
what he does. What he and others have said, aided by 
his military censor, has too long diverted public atten- 
tion from the deep significance of the facts. That an 
administration, chosen to save the country from finan- 
cial chaos on a platform which as to foreign policy 
merely promised carefully to watch and guard "all 
our interests in the western hemisphere" and employ 
the "influence and good offices" of the United States 
"to restore peace and give independence" to Cuba, 
should so far commit the country to a dangerous and 
revolutionary policy is itself a gross betrayal of the 
principle of representative government. 

24 



The imperial policy being new to us, none has aris- 
en to defend it on the merits. We are, however, as- 
sured by Mr. McKinley that the "Philippines, like 
Cuba and Porto Rico, were intrusted to our hands by 
the providence of God." If this is true, Providence 
made a poor delivery of the corpus of the trust. What 
we have is a mere quitclaim of a disputed title to 
property adversely possessed. Destiny, to say noth- 
ing of Providence, usually does much better in trans- 
ferring territory from the weak to the strong. 

It is widely urged that the chance location of a 
naval battle, even the hoisting of a flag without au- 
thority, has imposed upon us "a white man's burden" 
from which we may not without dishonor escape. If 
such are the consequences of unpremeditated action, 
we should pray to be delivered from naval victories 
and flag raisings. 

The claim is also pressed that by the destruction 
of the Spanish fleet in Manila bay we at once became 
responsible for public order in the Philippines and 
especially for the lives and property of foreigners resi- 
dent there. We know how a few widows as stock- 
holders of corporations are made to do duty in their 
defense against the righteous claims of the public. In 
the same way a few foreigners in Manila are made an 
excuse for a great injustice to a vast native popula- 
tion. Foreigners in whatever country subject them- 
selves and their property to its laws and protection. 
Their residence is from choice and they cannot com- 
plain if accorded such security as the people of the 
country enjoy. 

It is a bold assumption that the Filipinos will loot 
and murder. They have not done so. The only 
breech of public order since the close of the Spanish 
war has been in fact due to our presence in the islands. 
Our authority has at no time extended beyond the 
range of our guns. We have for some months held 
200 square miles of territory having a population of 
about 300,000. As for the remaining 200,000 miles of 
territory, with a population of perhaps 8,000,000, pub- 
lic order has been maintained for months by the peo- 
ple themselves. Beyond our lines, upon the testimony 
of our own officers, good order has prevailed and 
life and property have been secure. The shameful 

25 



truth is that desolation and ruin mark the character 
and limits of our influence in the islands. 

It was said of Caesar that he killed 1,000,000 Ger- 
mans, created a solitude and called it peace. Under 
the ghastly pretense of extending "the blessings of 
civilization" we are today carrying death and ruin 
into the country of a peaceful people. In the name 
of humanity and public order, in the name of civiliza- 
tion, in the defense of our own honor, even in the 
sacred cause of religion, we have assumed the role of 
bloody crusaders and let loose the hell hounds of ag- 
gressive war. When we have turned the Filipinos 
into corpses we shall pronounce them pacified. 

To kill, save in self-defense, is murder. To drive 
away women and children and burn their houses is 
outrage and arson. By this code we measure the con- 
duct of the individual. Are these crimes less crimi- 
nal when committed by a nation? Is war, except for 
national self-preservation, aught but the most mon- 
strous of crimes ? 

The war against the Filipinos has not even the poor 
excuse of legal authority. It is no part of the war 
against Spain. It was not declared by congress. A 
number of our wars with inferior races are known 
in history by personal names. To King Philip's war 
and others of this class must be added William Mc- 
Kinley's war. 

The vital defect in Mr. McKinley's policy lies in 
his purpose to extend American sovereignty over an 
aHen and unwilling people. The contention that our 
will, not theirs, shall be done in the Philippines runs 
counter to the law of our being as a nation. Our gov- 
ernment rests upon the proposition that the right of 
self-government is inherent in every people and can- 
not become the subject of grant. All its powers are 
delegated by the people. It is without power gra- 
ciously to grant to the Filipinos such measure of self- 
government as it shall from time to time deem them 
fit to enjoy. 

The Tribune this morning says that this meeting is 
to announce that "the American people cannot be 
trusted to give the Filipinos a just government." The 
reply to this is, that it is not the duty of the American 
people to give government, whether just or otherwise, 

26 



to anybody. Their own government is organized to 
secure the blessings of liberty to themselves and their 
posterity, to enable them to govern themselves, and 
not as a source of any kind of government whatever. 

Self-government has never fallen upon a people 
like a manna from above. It has everywhere been a 
self-achievement, a growth from within, not a deposit 
from without. If the Filipinos are really to be free, 
they must achieve freedom for themselves. Their 
right is to work their own way to self-government 
free from outside interference. 

We forget that the Filipinos may not wish to be as 
we are, that a people may be happy and even pros- 
perous under institutions unlike our own, and that 
even our duty to civilization may not require us to 
become benevolent assimilators of inferior races. In 
our desire to impose our institutions upon this alien 
people we disregard their right to govern — yea, even 
to misgovern — themselves. We have suddenly be- 
come strangely sensitive to danger to life and prop- 
erty, especially the lives and property of a handful of 
foreigners, in the Philippines. It seems that sup- 
posed and self-assumed duty to civilization requires 
us at once to secure in the islands a degree of security 
for life and property which prevails nowhere on this 
continent south of Mexico, a security which does not 
prevail at this moment in all parts of our own land. 
Had we insisted in 1865 on guarantees of public order 
in Mexico, Maximillian would have remained its em- 
peror. Mr. Seward at that time correctly stated our 
true position in urging the principle which "the 
United States hold in relation to all other nations," 
that "they have neither a right nor any disposition 
to intervene by force in the internal affairs of Mexico, 
whether to maintain a republican or even a despotic 
government there, or to overthrow an imperial or a 
foreign one, if Mexico shall choose to establish it or 
accept it;" and he finally insisted upon the with- 
drawal of the French troops solely upon the ground 
that we would not permit the establishment of a for- 
eign government in Mexico against the will of the 
Mexican people. 

Forcible annexation of the Philippines can no more 
be thought of in 1899 than in 1898. What would 

27 



have been "criminal aggression" last year is criminal 
aggression this year. It is as true at the close of the 
nineteenth century as it was at the end of the eight- 
eenth that taxation without representation is tyranny 
and that force cannot be employed as a chief instru- 
ment in the government of a free people. The Fil- 
ipinos must themselves choose ; for us to impose upon 
them a government would be rank disloyalty to our 
most cherished principles. 

The powers that shall henceforth be exercised in 
the government of the Philippine islands must come 
from their people or from Washington. Such pow- 
ers have neither been delegated nor can they be dele- 
gated to Mr. McKinley. The powers which he has 
thus far exercised in his personal crusade in behalf 
of trade and religion are self-assumed and despotic in 
character. 

The constitution makes no provision for the forci- 
ble intervention by our government in the affairs of 
a people who do not form an integral part of the 
union. To the extent we permit our chosen repre- 
sentatives to exercise arbitrary powers, whether at 
home or abroad, we allow them to sap and destroy 
representative government itself. Mr. McKinley is 
introducing at Washington the principles and meth- 
ods of absolutism. He mistakes a passion for power, 
which is as old as despotism, for the currents of des- 
tiny. There are currents of destiny, but they set to- 
ward human freedom and away from despotism. If we, 
the people, are to continue to rule even at home, we 
must reject the despot and his methods, although they 
come to us uttering fine phrases about benevolent 
assimilation, priceless principles, and hoisted flags. 

At this moment in our country, in our own city, 
the right of free men — whose duty it is to pass upon 
the acts of their official servants — to know the truth 
and to utter their protest is questioned. The word 
''rebel" is freely applied to men who never owed alle- 
giance to the United States. The spirit of impatience 
of constitutional processes has already reached the 
stage in which the words "treason" and "traitor" are' 
made to do duty in defense of arbitrary power. The 
question is squarely presented, shall ours become a 
government of men instead of a government of laws? 

28 



The powers which Mr. McKinley claims in the Phil- 
ippines cannot be exercised by a government which is 
merely representative. 

Despotic power has already appeared at Washing- 
ton, there to compete with delegated authority for final 
supremacy. These forces are as old as history. They 
cannot exist together. Our choice lies between 
them. 



DEMOCRACY OR TYRANNY. 

Address of Sigmund Zeisler. 

For the last few weeks the jingo press throughout 
the country took up the cry that those who express 
their opposition to the slaughter in the Philippines 
are guilty of treason and should be dealt with ac- 
cordingly. American citizens, do you realize what this 
means ? Is the voice of truth to be stifled ? Are we 
to become the slavish worshipers of our elected serv- 
ants ? Are we to be deprived of the freedom of speech, 
of the privilege of peaceable assemblage, of the right 
to deliberate for our common welfare? As yet such 
reactionary proposals do not meet with the approval of 
the government. But the mere fact that the supposed 
mouthpieces of public opinion can utter such a despi- 
cable suggestion, proves the demoralizing, the degen- 
erating, the degrading influence of imperialism. We 
cannot violate the eternal principle of liberty in the 
far East without at the same time striking a blow at 
our Democracy at home. Today the exercise of our 
constitutional right of free speech is called treason, 
tomorrow it may be called lese-majesty. The imperial- 
ism of today may be the militarism of tomorrow and 
the Caesarism of the day after tomorrow. 

For more than a century the people of this country 
have consecrated their best efforts to the cultivation 
of the arts of peace, to the pursuit of civic virtues, to 
the successful solution of the problem of popular gov- 
ernment. Who is guilty of treason now? We who 
demand that our people shall steadfastly pursue this 
course of national virtue and continue to build upon 

29 



the noble foundation laid by the great architects of 
our republic, or those who would egg us on to adven- 
turous wars, to land-grabbing expeditions, to a cru- 
sade against liberty, to the vast increase of our bur- 
dens of taxation, to the wanton sacrifice of American 
lives, to the spoliation and destruction of an inno- 
cent people, to the overthrow of our own best tra- 
ditions ? They tell us that manifest destiny has guided 
our course. The cry of manifest destiny is a cowardly 
evasion of responsibility. The statement that duty 
determines destiny is a meaningless and hollow phrase. 
It begs the whole question as to what our duty was 
and is. Destiny, indeed ! A destiny begotten to order, 
a destiny which is the bastard child of blatant jingoism 
and mercenary commercialism ! 

They tell us that the Filipinos are rebels and that 
it is right to shoot them down as such. Rebels? 
Since when do the Filipinos owe allegiance to our 
flag? Perhaps since we purchased them of Spain and 
paid two dollars a head for them? What right had 
Spain to sell them to us? Spain's title to the Philip- 
pines was clouded by a century of revolt against her 
misrule and oppression, a title as bad and as full of 
flaws as that to Cuba, of which we declared a year 
ago that she is and of right ought to be free and 
independent. And what right did we have to purchase 
the Filipinos? What right have we to force upon 
them our rule? Woe to the day on which a majority 
of the American people will have forgotten the sol- 
emn declaration of the builders of our nation that all 
men are created equal, that among the inalienable 
rights of man are life, liberty and the pursuit of hap- 
piness. Woe to the day when the American people 
will be prepared to deny that governments derive their 
just powers from the consent of the governed. 

But they tell us the Filipinos have misunderstood 
our motives ; no designs upon their territory were 
lurking in the imperialistic heart; we were guided by 
the purest philanthropy. Away with such hypocrisy ! 
Away with such sanctimonious declarations that are 
belied by our every act ! The truth is that the national 
administration, misled into the false belief that such 
a course would be popular, coveted the possession of 
the Philippines as a permanent colony. The truth was 

30 



half admitted by Secretary Gage, when, in a speech in 
the South last fall, he stated that our policy in the 
Philippines was "philanthropy and five per cent." 
Philanthropy and five per cent ! A philanthropy so 
passionate that in our iron embrace the object of our 
tender love is hugged to death. And five per cent? 
Where do they come in? The advantages of owning 
the Philippines are most problematical. Not in a hun- 
dred years could they repay the bare cost of subju- 
gating them and keeping them in subjection. And 
so we shall turn out to be deceived deceivers. 

Our attitude toward the Philippines was funda- 
mentally wrong from the beginning. From the outset 
we treated them as spoils of war. The day after the 
battle of Manila the jingo press of the whole country 
set up in unison the howl : "Keep the Philippines ! 
Keep the Philippines !" Was this the voice of human- 
ity? Was it philanthropy that spoke? It was base 
selfishness and lust of conquest. By and by we woke 
up to the fact that we could not keep what we did not 
yet have. And so we made an alliance — yes, an alli- 
ance, with Aguinaldo and his followers. We treated 
them as our friends. We counseled with them. We 
made them shed their blood in crushing our common 
foe. Our General Anderson as late as July 6th ad- 
dressed Aguinaldo as "Your Excellency," and asked 
his advice and co-operation. Our consuls at Singa- 
pore and Hongkong, claiming to represent our gov- 
ernment, had given the Filipino general, before he 
started for Manila, every assurance of the speedy 
recognition of his people's independence in return for 
his assistance. While these consuls were secretly re- 
buked by Secretary Day, Aguinaldo was treacherously 
kept in ignorance of the true attitude of our govern- 
ment. It was Aguinaldo and not our army that de- 
stroyed Spain's land power in the Philippines. Then 
came the negotiations for peace, and the imperialists 
howled : "Take the Philippines ! Take the Philip- 
pines !" Dewey sent to Paris his testimony 
to the effect that the nearly three millions 
native inhabitants of Luzon are gentle, do- 
cile, and, under just laws and with the benefits of 
popular education, would soon make good citizens, and 
he added that they are far superior in their intelli- 

31 



gence and more capable of self-government than the 
Cubans. All the unbiased evidence of the most com- 
petent observers agrees with Dewey's estimate of the 
Filipino character. The truth about these people has 
been studiously kept from our citizens. The fact is 
that throughout the island of Luzon, except Manila, 
orderly elections were held in the fall of '98, a con- 
gress was convened comparing in its composition most 
favorably with many of our state legislatures, a con- 
stitution was adopted based upon enlightened prin- 
ciples, and a government set up that left little to be 
desired. The Filipino republic desired to be heard in 
the deliberations of the peace commissioners at Paris. 
But their agents were treated with scorn. And while 
we had Spain relinquish her sovereignty over Cuba, 
we made her cede and sell the Philippines to us. Then 
came the president's proclamation establishing mili- 
tary government, treating the archipelago as our pos- 
sessions even before the treaty was ratified, and an- 
nouncing to the Filipinos that they must submit or 
be shot. And the jingo press echoed : "Submit or 
be shot !" Aguinaldo all this while was given by Otis 
the cold, stony stare. And yet he had confidence in 
the virtue of the American republic. He hoped and 
prayed that we would allow his people to enjoy inde- 
pendence under an American protectorate. From day 
to day they waited for an official declaration by the 
congress of the United States, disclaiming the inten- 
tion to exercise permanent sovereignty over the Phil- 
ippine islands and assuring them of independence at 
some time in the future. But one after another of 
the many resolutions introduced tending to commit 
our country to this just course was voted down. 
Finally, on the eve of the ratification of the peace 
treaty, which was to settle the fate of the Filipinos 
adversely to their wishes, some shots were exchanged 
between the American and Filipino lines. Which 
side fired first is a disputed question. May be the 
rash hand of some Filipino, goaded on to desperation 
by our contemptuous treatment, sent the first shot into 
our lines. Aguinaldo at once disclaimed responsibil- 
ity and was still anxious for peace. But Otis haughtily 
refused to listen to him. A rebellion was the very 
thing which our administration needed most urgently 

32 



just then to cause a stampede for the ratification of 
the peace treaty, which looked rather dubious. From 
that day on to this we. had in those unfortunate isles 
the hell of war, whose grewsome details we have read 
from day to day with growing indignation and 
disgust. 

Meanwhile our reputation for philanthropy has suf- 
fered severely every day. We have loaded so much 
humanity into our guns and rifles that our supply is 
well nigh exhausted. Our work of pacification has 
been most effective. Every day several hundred 
wretched Filipinos were dispatched into that peaceful 
valley whence there is no return. But the pacification 
in our own ranks was hardly less rapid. The Filipinos 
are not such past masters as we are in the art of 
administering hypodermic injections of humanity, but 
they have in their pacification business powerful allies 
in the climate and condition of their soil, harmless 
to them but deadly to our soldiers — poor, courageous, 
generous, noble boys ! They are fighting gallantly in 
a cause that cannot appeal to them. They bravely 
and without murmur obey orders when their hearts 
must be bleeding with sympathy for the struggle of 
those whom they assault. Heaven grant that we may 
have seen the last of this inhuman and un-American 
struggle ! If peace is not now assured, what has pre- 
ceded will be child's play compared with what is to 
follow during the summer season. It will not then be 
a question of bravery and superior intelligence of our 
soldier boys. For the burning rays of a tropical sun, 
the drenching showers of fever-laden clouds, the 
blighting breath of pestilential morasses will be the 
silent partners fighting on the side of the Filipinos. 
We may crush them, bring them to their knees, and 
still eternal right and justice are on their side, and 
sooner or later we must suffer the consequences of 
our criminal aggression. For our war against the 
Filipinos gives the lie to our professions and history 
for 120 years, it repudiates the principles of our 
declaration of independence, it condemns the guiding 
motives of our war of emancipation, it undermines 
the groundwork of our national existence, it is op- 
posed to the teachings of Washington, of Jefferson 
and of our own immortal Lincoln. 



33 



Our bungling course has already produced irre- 
parable damage. The glamor of victory will not dry 
the tears of the mothers, widows and orphans whose 
dead are buried in Asiatic soil. The survivors of our 
army will bring home filthy diseases that will taint the 
blood of coming generations. But the greatest dam- 
age is to our national honor, to our reputation as a 
humane, freedom-loving and Christian nation. The 
yellow press are frantic with delight because the poor 
Filipinos are begging for peace. But have they counted 
the cost of this victory, if victory it should turn out 
to be? I am reminded of Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, 
who, after defeating the Romans in a fierce battle with 
enormous losses in his own ranks, cried out: "One 
more such victory and I am lost." I love my country 
as I love my life, but I say : Heaven grant that 
America be saved from more such victorious wars! 
Heaven grant that there shall be no further descent 
on the toboggan slide of national degradation! 

Some time ago the imperialists began to realize what 
a mess they had made of this whole miserable busi- 
ness. The dread reality of the situation awakened 
them from their dream of aggrandizement. The ad- 
ministration, I am informed, has been anxious for 
some time to let go of the Philippines, but were pray- 
ing for somebody to show them how. Will they take 
the opportunity offered by Aguinaldo's seeking peace ? 
Or will our pious imperialists say that the "god of bat- 
tles," who has given them victory, has bid them put 
their iron heels upon the necks of the vanquished? 
There is yet time to make honorable amends. Let not 
foolish pride or the consideration of politics keep this 
great nation from acknowledging that imperialism 
is an awful mistake for us. Let justice be done though 
the heavens fall. Let us have no thought of treating 
the Philippines as a subject colony. Let congress at 
the earliest practicable moment pledge this country to 
the recognition of the independence of the Filipinos 
upon just terms and conditions and as soon as 
they can establish an orderly government. Let us, by 
diplomatic agencies, procure the common consent of 
nations to keep hands off the islands. Let us stand by 
them, not as their rulers, but as their friends, while 
they need our protection and while they recover from 

34 



the wounds we have inflicted. If we do this we shall 
yet be able to procure all the commercial advantages 
which the ownership of these islands could possibly 
secure to us without any of the burdens of governing 
them. Let them be happy in their own way and let us 
not enforce upon them happiness according to our 
standard. Let us remember our own struggle for in- 
dependence and have sympathy with them in theirs. 
Let us not in Asia make distinctions of race and color 
which our fathers have shed their blood to stamp out 
at home. 

What William Lloyd Garrison said in the cause of 
abolition is equally true today in the cause of anti- 
imperialism : 

They tell me, Liberty ! that in thy name 
I may not plead for all the human race, 
That some are born to bondage and disgrace — 
So, to a heritage of woe and shame — 
And some to power supreme, and glorious fame. 
With my whole soul I spurn the doctrine base 
And, as an equal brotherhood, embrace 
All people, and for all fair freedom claim. 
Know this, O man ! whate'er thy earthly fate, 
God never made a tyrant nor a slave ; 
Woe, then, to those who dare to desecrate 
His glorious image — for to all He gave 
Eternal rights which none may violate, 
And by a mighty hand the oppressed He yet shall 
save. 



DEMOCRACY OR MILITARISM. 

Address of Miss Jane Addams. 

None of us who has been reared and nurtured in 
America can be wholly without the democratic in- 
stinct. It is not a question with any of us of having 
it or not having it ; it is merely a question of trusting it 
or not trusting it. For good or ill we suddenly find 
ourselves bound to an international situation. The 
question practically reduces itself to this : Do we 

35 



mean to democratize the situation? Are we going to 
trust our democracy, or are we going to weakly imitate 
the policy of other governments, which have never 
claimed a democratic basis? 

The political code, as well as the moral law, has no 
meaning and becomes absolutely emptied of its con- 
tents if we take out of it all relation to the world and 
concrete cases, and it is exactly in such a time as this 
that we discover what we really believe. We may 
make a mistake in politics as well as in morals by 
forgetting that new conditions are ever demanding 
the evolution of a new morality, along old lines but in 
larger measure. Unless the present situation extends 
our nationalism into internationalism, unless it has 
thrust forward our patriotism into humanitarianism we 
cannot meet it. 

We must also remember that peace has come to 
mean a larger thing. It is no longer merely absence of 
war, but the unfolding of life processes which are mak- 
ing for a common development. Peace is not merely 
something to hold congresses about and to discuss as 
an abstract dogma. It has come to be a rising tide of 
moral feeling, which is slowly engulfing all pride of 
conquest and making war impossible. 

Under this new conception of peace it is perhaps 
natural that the first men to formulate it and give 
it international meaning should have been working- 
men, who have always realized, however feebly and 
vaguely they may have expressed it, that it is they 
who in all ages have borne the heaviest burden of 
privation and suffering imposed on the world by the 
military spirit. 

The 'first international organization founded not to 
promote a colorless peace, but to advance and develop 
the common life of all nations was founded in Lon- 
don in 1864 by workingmen and called simply 
"The International Association of Workingmen." 
They recognized that a supreme interest raised all 
workingmen above the prejudice of race, and united 
them by wider and deeper principles than those by 
which they were separated into nations. That as re- 
ligion, science, art, had become international, so now 
at last labor took its position as an international in- 
terest. A few years later, at its third congress, held 

36 



in Brussels in I&68, the internationals recommended 
in view of the Franco-German war, then threatening, 
that "the workers resist all war as systematic murder," 
and in case of war a universal strike be declared. 

This is almost exactly what is now happening in 
Russia. The peasants are simply refusing to drill and 
fight and the czar gets credit for a peace manifesto 
the moral force of which comes from the humblest of 
his subjects. It is not, therefore, surprising that as 
long ago as last December, the organized workingmen 
of America recorded their protest against the adoption 
of an imperialistic policy. 

In the annual convention of the American Federa- 
tion of Labor, held that month in Kansas City, reso- 
lutions were adopted indorsing the declaration made 
by President Gompers in his opening address : "It has 
always been the hewers of wood and the carriers of 
water, the wealth producers, whose mission it ha* 
been not only to struggle for freedom, but to be ever 
vigilant to maintain the liberty of freedom achieved, 
and it behooves the representatives of the grand army 
of labor in convention assembled to give vent to the 
alarm we feel from the dangers threatening us and 
our entire people, to enter our solemn and emphatic 
protest against what we already feel ; that, with the 
success of imperialism the decadence of our -republic 
will have already set in." 

There is a growing conviction among workingmen 
of all countries that, whatever may be accomplished 
by a national war, however high the supposed moral 
aim of such a war, there is one inevitable result — an 
increased standing army, the soldiers of which aie 
non-producers and must be fed by the workers. The 
Russian peasants support an army of 1,000,000, the 
German peasants sow and reap for 500,000 more. The 
men in these armies spend their muscular force in 
drilling, their mental force in thoughts of warfare. 
The mere hours of idleness conduce mental and moral 
deterioration. 

The appeal to the fighting instinct does not end in 
mere warfare, but arouses these brutal instincts latent 
in every human being. The countries with the large 
standing armies are likewise the countries with na- 
tional hospitals for the treatment of diseases which 

37 



should never exist, of iarge asyiums for the care of 
children which should never have been born. These 
institutions, as well as the barracks, again increase 
the taxation, which rests, in the last analysis, upon 
producers, and, at the same time, withdraws so much 
of their product from the beneficient development of 
their national life. No one urges peaceful association 
with more fervor than the workingman. Organization 
is his only hope, but it must be kept distinct from 
militarism, which can never be made a democratic in- 
strument. 

Let us not make the mistake of confusing moral is- 
sues sometimes involved in warfare with warfare itself. 
Let us not glorify the brutality. The same strenuous 
endeavor, the same heroic self-sacrifice, the same fine 
courage and readiness to meet death, may be displayed 
without the accompaniment of killing our fellow men. 
With all Kipling's insight he has, over and over, failed 
to distinguish between war and imperialism on the 
one hand and the advance of civilization on the other. 

To "protect the weak" has always been the excuse 
of the ruler and tax-gatherer, the chief, the king, the 
baron; and now, at last, of "the white man." The 
form of government is not necessarily the function 
itself. Government is not something extraneous, con- 
sisting of men who wear gold lace and sit on high 
stools and write rows of figures in books. We forget 
that an ideal government is merely an adjustment be- 
tween men concerning their mutual relations towards 
those general matters which concern them all; that 
the office of an outside and alien people must always 
be to collect taxes and to hold a negative law and 
order. In its first attempt to restore mere order and 
quiet, the outside power inevitably breaks down the 
framework of the nascent government itself, the more 
virile and initiative forces are destroyed ; new rela- 
tions must in the end be established, not only with 
the handicap of smart animosity on the part of the 
conquered, but with the loss of the most able citizens 
among them. 

Some of us were beginning to hope that we were 
getting away from the ideals set by the civil war, that 
we had made all the presidents we could from men 
who had distinguished themselves in that war, and 

38 






were coming to seek another type of man. That we 
were ready to accept the peace ideal, to be proud of 
our title as a peace nation ; to recognize that the man 
who cleans a city is greater than he, who bombards 
it, and the man who irrigates a plain greater than he 
who lays it waste. Then came the Spanish war, with 
its gilt and lace and tinsel, and again the moral issues 
are confused with exhibitions of brutality. 

For ten years I have lived in a neighborhood which 
is by no means criminal, and yet during last October 
and November we were startled by seven murders 
within a radius of ten blocks. A little investigation of 
details and motives, the accident of a personal ac- 
quaintance with two of the criminals, made it not in 
the • least difficult to trace the murders back to the 
influence of the war. Simple people who read of car- 
nage and bloodshed easily receive its suggestions. 
Habits of self-control which have been but slowly and 
imperfectly acquired quickly break down under the 
stress. 

Psychologists intimate that action is determined by 
the selection of the subject upon which the attention 
is habitually fixed. The newspapers, the theatrical 
posters, the street conversations for weeks had to do 
with war and bloodshed. The little children on the 
street played at war, dav after day, killing Spaniards. 
The humane instinct, which keeps in abeyance the 
tendency to cruelty, the growing belief that the life of 
each human being — however hopeless or degraded, is 
still sacred — gives way, and the barbaric instinct as- 
serts itself. 

It is doubtless only during a time of war that the 
men and women of Chicago could tolerate whipping 
for children in our city prison, and it is only during 
such a time that the introduction in the legislature of 
a bill for the re-establishment of the whipping post 
could be possible. National events determine our 
ideals, as much as our ideals determine national 
events. 



39 



REPUBLIC OR EMPIRE. 

Address of Bishop Spalding. 

The rise and fall of nations as of individuals are 
determined by moral causes. The convictions of man- 
kind are but feebly influenced by reason. Our ethics, 
politics and religions never spring from what is wholly 
rational. To a greater or less extent we are all vic- 
tims of passion and prejudice, are swayed by interests 
that are selfish and motives that are unworthy. The 
wise and the good therefore subject themselves to 
ceaseless self-criticism, so does a noble and generous 
people. The habit of reflection, of considering seri- 
ously and dispassionately whatever grave situation is 
presented is a mark of maturity; it is an evidence of 
self-control, of. the prevalence of the true self, which 
is constituted by obedience to what is right and good 
and becoming. 

It is to the power of returning upon itself that a 
people owes its conservative strength, its ability, in 
the midst of whatever events, to hold steadfastly to the 
principles by which its life is nourished. We are at 
present in the midst of a crisis in which lack of 
thought and deliberation may lead us far from the 
ideals which as Americans we have most cherished 
and expose us to evils of which we scarcely dream. 
We stand at the parting of the ways. It is not yet too 
late to turn from the way which leads through war and 
conquest to imperialism, to standing armies, to alli- 
ances with foreign powers and finally to the disruption 
of the union itself. It is not too late, because it is still 
possible, probable even, that the American people will 
reconsider the whole question of the complications in 
which our victories over Spain have involved us, and, 
calling to mind the fact that they did not enter into 
this war for the purpose of becoming an empire, but 
for the purpose of helping others to throw off the yoke 
of a tyrannical imperialism, will see that to be blinded 
and led away by success is to be weak and foolish, or, 
rather, since here the highest interests of humanity are 
at stake, is to be wicked and criminal. If this may 

40 






not be, then the American people have degenerated, 
they have lost their hold upon the historical causes 
and the political habits which led to the founding of 
our institutions and to the marvelous growth and pros- 
perity of our country. But we judge of a man's wis- 
dom by his hope — 

Hope, the paramount duty which leaves laws 
For its own honor or man's suffering heart. 
Therefore, we shall not believe that the gaining of a 
few naval battles over a weak and unprepared foe 
have power to throw us into such enthusiasm or such 
madness as to turn us permanently from the princi- 
ples and policies to which we owe our national exist- 
ence, our life and liberty ; or that destiny, the divinity 
of fatalists and materialists, can weaken our faith in 
the God of justice, righteousness and love, who scorns 
and thrusts far away those who, having the giants' 
strength, use it to oppress or destroy the weak and 
ignorant. 

"We have never looked upon ourselves as predes- 
tined to subdue the earth, to compel other nations, 
with sword and shell, to accept our rule. We have 
always believed in human rights, in freedom and op- 
portunity, in education and religion, and we have in- 
vited all men to come and enjoy these blessings in 
this half of the world which God has given us ; but we 
have never dreamed that they were articles to be ex- 
ported and thrust down unwilling throats at the point 
of the bayonet. We have sympathized with all op- 
pressed peoples — with Ireland, Greece, Armenia, 
Cuba. To emancipate the slave we gladly sacrificed 
the lives" of hundreds of thousands of our soldiers. 
And now the American soldier, who should never 
shoulder a gun except in a righteous cause, is sent 10,- 
ooo miles across the ocean to shoot men whose real 
crime is that they wish to be free — wish to govern 
themselves. To say that they are unfit for freedom is 
to put forth the plea of the tyrant in all ages and 
everywhere. The enemies of liberty have never lack- 
ed for pretexts to justify their wrongs ; but, in truth, 
at the root of all wars of conquest there lies lust for 
blood or for gold. 

If the inhabitants of the Philippines came gladly to 
throw themselves into our arms we should refuse to 

41 



do more than counsel, guide and protect them until 
they form themselves into a stable and independent 
government. What, then, is to be thought of those 
who seem resolved either to rule or exterminate them, 
believing, probably, that the only good Filipino is a 
dead Filipino? 

A war of conquest is in contradiction with our fun- 
damental principles of government ; it is opposed to 
all our traditions. The thought of ruling over sub- 
ject peoples is repugnant to our deepest and noblest 
sentiments. It is part of our good fortune or our 
providential position in the world that our country is 
vast enough and self-sufficient enough to make all de- 
sire for conquest an unholy and meaningless tempta- 
tion. We have room for 300,000,000 or 400,000,000 
of human beings. If more are required and we are 
true to ourselves British America will come to us with- 
out there being need of firing a gun. We have money 
enough already and our wealth is increasing rapidly. 
What we have to learn is how to live, how to dis- 
tribute our money, how to take from it its mastery 
over us and make it our servant. 

Our capital is fast becoming the most inhuman, the 
most iniquitous tyrant the world has ever known. Its 
tyranny is a blight and curse to those who exercise 
it as well as to the multitude who are its victims. Com- 
mercial and manufacturing competition is becoming 
a struggle for existence fiercer than that which makes 
nature red in tooth and claw. Whereas the tendency 
of true civilization and religion is to convert the strug- 
gle for life into co-operation for life, into work of all 
for all that all may have those inner goods which 
make men wise, holy, beautiful and strong; whereas, 
this is the tendency of right civilization, our greed, 
our superstitious belief in money as the only true god 
and savior of man hurries us on with increasing speed 
into all the venalities, dishonesties and corruptions, 
into all the tricks and trusts by which the people are 
disheartened and impoverished. We are hypnotized 
by the glitter and glare, the pompous circumstances of 
wealth and are becoming incapable of a rational view 
of life. We have lost taste for simple things and sim- 
ple ways. We flee from the country as from a desert 
and find self-forgetfulness only amid the noise and 

42 



rush of great cities, where high thought and pure af- 
fection are well-nigh impossible. How far we have 
drifted from that race of farmers who threw off the 
yoke of England and built the noble state, who be- 
lieved that honor was better than money, freedom 
than luxury and display. Their plain democratic re- 
public is no longer good enough for us. We are be- 
come imperial. We must have mighty armies and 
navies which shall encircle the earth to bring into sub- 
jection weak and unprotected savages and barbarians. 
Why ? For glory ? No. That is a standpoint we 
have left behind. For humanity? Wholesale murder 
is not humanity. Why? For money, more money, 
money without end. We are the victims of commer- 
cialism. We have caught the contagion of the insan- 
ity that the richest nations are the worthiest and most 
enduring. We have lost sight of the eternal principle 
that all freedom is inrooted in moral freedom, that 
Tiches are akin to fear and death, that by the soul only 
can a nation be great. 

Spiritual gifts survive when the marts of com- 
merce are deserted and are become the habitations 
of doubtful creatures. Money indeed is power, but 
it is power for good only when it belongs to the wise 
and the good. For the foolish, the prodigal, the sen- 
sual and the miserly it is a curse. A brave, honest 
and loving soul has higher worth than mountains of 
gold. He who knows that the good of life lies within, 
that it is capable of being cherished, loved and pos- 
sessed more and more by whoever seeks it with all his 
mind and heart can never think that a nation's first 
duty is to spread its trade even at the loss of all that 
constitutes the true dignity of man, in multitudes of 
men and women who are degraded to the level of ma- 
chinery. Personality is the highest and most sacred 
fact we know. By personalities religion and culture 
are created, propagated and preserved. When great 
souls are alive with great thoughts and profound emo- 
tions it is good to be on earth. Then God comes near- 
er and man is divine. 

It had been our hope that in the latest birth of time 
we, the favored children of heaven, were to be provi- 
dentially guided to nobler issues, that here the many 
should become what but a few have ever been — wise, 

43 



self-contained, generous, helpful and loving. But this- 
hope is no longer cherished, this ideal lures us no> 
more. We have become believers in destiny and des- 
tiny knows nothing of wisdom and goodness — it is 
nature's fatal sway, pitiless, blind, destroying, to rise 
above which has been the ceaseless effort of all heroes, 
saints and sages by which the race has been blessed 
and ennobled. 

If it is our destiny to become an empire it is not 
our destiny to endure as a republic. Empire and im- 
perialism are associated with kingly and arbitrary 
rule, with militarism and conquest. Was not the Ro- 
man empire built on the ruins of the republic? Was. 
it not made possible by the general loss of virtue and 
patriotism, by the luxury and corruption which the 
stolen wealth of a hundred cities had spread through 
Rome? It is only when the inner sources of life run. 
low that men rush madly to gain possession of exter- 
nal things. When the power of faith and hope and 
love is lost the animal in man's breast awakes and 
cries for blood or plunges into the slough of sensuality. 
When the real good of life escapes us money and 
what money buys seem to be all that is left. Then 
men become cowards, liars and thieves. They cringe 
and fawn and palter. They worship success. They 
call evil good and good evil. They have no convic- 
tions which are not lucrative, no opinions which are 
not profitable. Then all things are for sale, then dem- 
agogues are heroes, then opportunities for plunder are 
welcome, then the best policy is that which wins most 
votes and most money. 

But we are told that imperialism has proved a 
blessing to Great Britain. In this matter there is no 
parity between England and the United States. Again 
and again England has been conquered by Romans, 
Saxon, Angle, Dane and Norman. As her population 
increased she became less and less able to feed her 
people without drawing her supplies from other coun- 
tries, and to-day if she could be blockaded for six 
months she would starve. She is compelled, there- 
fore, to have a navy as strong almost as that of all the 
other nations, and this has led her to make conquest 
after conquest until her empire encircles the earth. 
But these widely scattered dominions, though possi- 



44 



bly necessary for her existence as a first-class poweiv 
are for her a cause of weakness. Let her colonies but 
become dissatisfied and they will fall from her as- 
easily as the ripe fruit falls from the bough. She gov- 
erns them wisely, because only in this way can she 
govern them at all. It is hardly possible for an. 
American to speak of England and not to feel grate- 
ful thoughts and kindly sentiments stir within his 
breast. To her largely we owe our liberties ; to her 
our language ; to her Shakespeare, Milton and Words- 
worth ; to her Bacon and Ruskin and Newman. Even, 
in the war of independence our greatest men still re- 
tained a kind of affection for her, as among her states- 
men our cause found some of its ablest and most elo- 
quent advocates. And now that more than a cen- 
tury has elapsed we can easily forgive and forget the 
wrongs she did us, especially since they stirred us- 
to assert and maintain our independence. Neverthe- 
less, the more we hold aloof from England the better 
shall it be for America. She has not an ally in the 
world, and there is probably not a nation in the world 
which would trust her as an ally. She has never loved 
us from the days in which she oppressed the colonies 
to the dark days when by aiding the confederacy she 
sought to make the disruption of the union perma- 
nent. She does not love us now. We are the most 
dreaded rival she has, because we threaten her su- 
premacy in what is nearest and dearest to her — her 
finances. She is confronted by difficulties and dan- 
gers of various kinds from which we are free. An 
alliance with her would involve us in the difficulties 
and dangers by which she is confronted and from 
which we are free. We need neither her advice nor 
her assistance. The praises which she now bestows 
on us, were they sincere, would be superfluous, but 
since they are given with the design of drawing us- 
into an imperialistic policy and troublesome entangle- 
ments they are insidious and insulting. Our wisest, 
statesmen have always been opposed to militarism as. 
a menace to our liberties. We want nothing more than 
the nucleus of an army, nothing which shall serve as- 
a means of conquest at home or abroad ; and, for my 
own part, I think a powerful navy a danger rather 
than a protection. So long as we are content to de- 

45 



v r ote ourselves to the tasks which God has set us we 
can have nothing to fear, even from a coalition of the 
powers of Europe, were such a thing possible.' 

We do not need a large standing army or a great 
navy either for conquest or self-defense. They are 
not necessary, as they would be dangerous to our 
peace and liberty. There was a time in our history 
when the general government seemed to be too weak 
and the states too strong. That condition of things 
passed away with the close of our civil war, when the 
executive seemed to acquire a new quality which 
clothed him with almost dictatorial power. It did not 
seem impossible to build a military despotism on 
American institutions. With ourselves, as in the rest 
of the civilized world, there is a drift toward socialism. 
We must face the great problems thus raised with 
faith in our political principles and with confidence in 
the good sense and honesty of the people. To seek 
refuge in the intervention of a standing army, under 
the command of a quasi-dictator or emperor, is to 
enter in the way of anarchy and ruin. On many sides 
there is evidence of moral decadence. Religion is los- 
ing its hold on the masses, respect for those who fill 
positions of authority is diminishing, the rights of 
property are becoming less sacred, the marriage tie 
is loosening, greed is increasing, capital becoming 
more unscrupulous. The virtue of thrift, moderation 
and forethought are less considered. We neither draw 
wisdom and inspiration from the past nor look to the 
future, but live like thoughtless children in the pres- 
ent. The distrust of the people of the men they elect 
to office is at once discouraging and injurious to pub- 
lic morality. Human life is taken on slight provoca- 
tion and outrages which blacken our fair name are 
committed by mobs which seem to have lost all sense 
of humanity. In that which essentially constitutes 
education — the development of science, the formation 
of characters — our schools seem in a large measure to 
have failed. It is, of course, possible to take a differ- 
ent and brighter view of our condition by emphasizing 
our wealth, our national progress, our growth in num- 
bers, our enlightenment, our enterprise ; but a jvise 
man gives little heed to that in which he succeeds, 
that he may better study wherein he fails. Why 

46 



should we turn from wkat is unpleasant if by consid- 
ering it we may learn useful lessons? If we but 
have the courage to look steadfastly and to see things 
as they are we shall easily see that our true work lies 
here, and not thousands of miles away. We are the 
foremost bearers of the most precious treasure of the 
races. In the success of the experiment which we 
are making the hopes of all noble and generous souls 
for a higker life of mankind are centered. If we 
fail, the world fails ; if we succeed, we shall do more; 
for the good of all men than if we conquered all the 
islands and continents. Our mission is to show that 
popular government on a vast scale is compatable with 
the best culture, the purest religion, the highest jus- 
tice, and that it can permanently endure. In -com- 
parison with this what would be a thousand groups 
of Philippines? What the most brilliant career of 
imperial pomp and glory? 

When the American people resolved not to hold, 
what they never intended to take possession of they 
will have little difficulty in finding a solution of this 
Philippine difficulty. Above all, let them not be misled 
by vanity; let them not harken to the siren voice of 
English flattery ; let them not stop to think what 
other nations shall say, but let them, as becomes a 
great, a free and enlightened people, be self-directed, 
holding in view only such aims and ends as are wise 
and just and conducive to the permanent welfare and. 
highest interest of the republic. 



47 



REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON RESOLU- 
TIONS. 

Remarks of Prof. William Gardner Hale, Chair- 
man: 

I hold in my hands the resolutions of the commit- 
tee. Before I present them, however, I beg your per- 
mission to say, very briefly, why I have welcomed 
this service, and why I believe it to be our duty to 
pass the resolutions. 

Two grave mistakes, fatal alik? to the Filipinos and 
;to us, have been made in the dealings of this nation 
with its new proteges. The earliest was committed by 
our chief magistrate, when, at the critical moment of 
his first official utterance to the people we had set 
free from Spanish tyranny, he offered them "good and 
stable government" with one hand, and with the other 
exacted unconditional obedience. The second, like 
unto it, was committed by our commanding general, 
when he refused even to listen to the overtures of the 
natural leader of the Filipinos, whom we ourselves 
had carried to Luzon, on an American battleship, to 
help us against the common enemy. "Submission or 
death," said Spain to Cuba, and plunged us, a year 
ago, into a war for liberty and humanity. The de- 
struction of the Spanish fleet and the capture of Ma- 
nila "have practically effected the conquest of the 
Philippine islands." . . . "As a result of the vic- 
tories of American arms the future control, disposi- 
tion and government of the Philippine islands are 
ceded to the United States," said President McKin- 
ley to the Filipinos.* "Submission or death," said 
Otis, when the inevitable war followed. These two 
blunders, which the American people are even now 
beginning to recognize, and of which our children 
will sometime think with shame and wonder, our ad- 
ministration is engaged in burying under military 
glory, with "the strong arm of authority," killing 

^Proclamation of January 5, 1899. 

48 



thousands of Filipinos, at the cost of the lives of hun- 
dreds of brave American soldiers, who did not need 
to die to prove either American courage of American 
force. Not one syllable of concilliation has thus far 
been uttered. The President's ominous word, "con- 
quest" — a word probably never, before spoken in any 
American document of state — has been fitly and stead- 
ily backed by the general's words, "unconditional sur- 
render." 

But a third mistake, fellow-citizens, and no light 
one, lies at the door of us who are gathered here today, 
and at the doors of vast numbers of men and women 
throughout the country, who either did not see, in that 
fate-bearing proclamation of January 5th, the com- 
plete subversion of the fundamental principles of this 
proud Republic, and the inevitable seeds of a degrad- 
ing war with a people struggling, just as the Cubans 
had struggled, to be free, or who, so seeing, failed to 
raise their voices in instant protest and warning. And 
this duty of open speech, which should have been clear 
to us then, becomes clearer every day, when so many 
of the men of the newspaper, the self-appointed rep- 
resentatives of the public conscience and intelligence, 
dare even to apply the name of "traitor" to any one 
that differs from a magistrate clothed by our own 
votes with a little brief authority, and who confessedly 
himself desires to be guided by that very public opin- 
ion which they would suppress. It is time that we 
spoke; and we of Chicago, who, in the fulfillment of 
this duty, are so far behind our fellow-citizens of 
many parts of the country, should not let another sun 
g*o down upon our silence. Your committee, then, 
offers to you these resolutions, in which, as it believes, 
are embodied the sentiments that actuate you who are 
gathered here .today, and the principles which, until 
now, every American child has breathed in with his 
native air. 



49 



THE RESOLUTIONS.* 

The frank expression of honest convictions upon 
great questions of public policy is vital to the health 
and even to the preservation of representative gov- 
ernment. Such expression is, therefore, the sacred 
duty of American citizens. 

We hold that the policy known as imperialism is 
hostile to liberty and tends toward militarism, an evil 
from which it has been our glory to be free. We re- 
gret that it is now necessary in the land of Washing- 
ton and Lincoln to reaffirm that all men, of whatever 
race or color, are entitled to life, liberty and the pur- 
suit of happiness. W 7 e still maintain that govern- 
ments derive their just powers from the consent of 
the governed. We insist that the forcible subjugation 
of a purchased people is "criminal aggression" and 
open disloyalty to the distinctive principles of our gov- 
ernment. 

We honor our soldiers and sailors in the Philip- 
pine islands for their unquestioned bravery and we 
mourn with the whole nation for the American lives 
that have been sacrificed. Their duty was obedience 
to orders ; our duty is diligent inquiry and fearless 
protest. We hold that our government created the 
conditions which have brought about the sacrifice. 

We earnestly condemn the policy of the present na- 
tional administration in the Philippines. It is the 
spirit of '76 that our government is striving to extin- 
guish in those islands ; we denounce the attempt and 
demand its abandonment. We deplore and resent the 
slaughter of the Filipinos as a needless horror, a deep 
dishonor to our nation. 

We protest against the extension of American em- 
pire by Spanish methods and demand the immediate 
cessation of the war against liberty begun by Spain 
and continued by us. We believe that a foolish pride 
is the chief obstacle to a speedy settlement of all diffi- 
culties. As Mr. Gladstone said to England, "We are 

♦The great audience adopted these resolutions by a rising vote, 
but four voting in the negative. 

50 



strong enough * * * to cast aside all consider- 
ations of false shame * * * walking in the plain 
and simple ways of right and justice." Our govern- 
ment should at once announce to the Filipinos its 
purpose to grant thenT under proper guarantees of 
order the independence for which they have so long 
fought, and should seek by diplomatic methods to 
secure this independence by the common consent of 
nations. It is today as true of the Filipinos as it was 
a year ago of the Cubans that they "are and of right 
ought to be free and independent." 



51 



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